Saturday, November 04, 2006

A Matter of Trust....and Fear

How the World Sees it: Fear = G.W. Bush

Surprise, or is it? It was President Lincoln who said: "You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time." Here our president is going hoarse trying to convince voters in America that Democrats cannot be trusted and that they are weak on terrorism. The warmonger has become fearmonger. The polls are predicting an outcome that, if proven right, would cripple the remaining years of Bush presidency. So his desperation is a no brainer. But on the other side of the Atlantic our closest allies in the Coalition, the Brits have a different, very different, outlook. They don't feel good about the fact that Prime Minister Blair hitched up his star (which has become tarnished) to Bush's war, and they think that our president is a dangerous man.

In a recent survey conducted by major newspapers in four countries -- The Guardian (UK), Haaretz in Israel, La Presse and Toronto Star in Canada, and the Reforma in Mexico -- President Bush is No.2 among those who are considered as dangerous to world peace. He is between Osama bin Laden (No.1) and North Korea's Kim Jong-il (No.3) ! bin Laden received 87% rating, President Bush 75%, and Kim Jong-il 69%.

Caption of the article in The Guardian reads: "British believe Bush is more dangerous than Kim Jong-il"

America is now seen as a threat to world peace by its closest neighbours and allies, according to an international survey of public opinion published today that reveals just how far the country's reputation has fallen among former supporters since the invasion of Iraq.

Carried out as US voters prepare to go to the polls next week in an election dominated by the war,the research also shows that British voters see George Bush as a greater danger to world peace than either the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-il, or the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Both countries were once cited by the US president as part of an "axis of evil", but it is Mr Bush who now alarms voters in countries with traditionally strong links to the US.

If Democrats manage to take control of one or both houses of Congress on Tuesday, the reason will be that voters were not adequately roused into a state of heart-pounding, knee-knocking, teeth-chattering fear.

Not that Republicans haven't been trying. George W. Bush used to claim he was "a uniter, not a divider," but that was a long time ago. These days, he'd probably try to deny the quote the same way he tried to disown "stay the course." The Karl Rove formula for political victory has been to draw a bright line between "us" and "them" and then paint those on the other side not as opponents but as monsters.

*****

"Fair is foul, and foul is fair: Hover through the fog and filthy air"